


ask the ghosts if honor matters

by brodinsons (aeon_entwined)



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Angst and Humor, Blind Soldier: 76 | Jack Morrison, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Hurt No Comfort, M/M, Obsessive Behavior, geriatric romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-19
Updated: 2016-12-19
Packaged: 2018-09-09 18:25:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,424
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8907166
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aeon_entwined/pseuds/brodinsons
Summary: After his life is saved at the eleventh hour by an entity he couldn't identify, Jack Morrison sets out to track down the one person on the planet who could possibly know who he is and still want him alive.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Jara257](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jara257/gifts).



> My entry for the [OW Big Bang](http://owbigbang.tumblr.com/)! My partner was the delightful [Jara257](http://jara257.tumblr.com/), who was invaluable in soothing my first-timer nerves on our way through this thing. Their [artistic rendering](http://jara257.tumblr.com/post/154680918689/my-part-in-the-ow-big-bang-this-one-is-a) of one of the later scenes in the fic is absolutely _sublime_!
> 
> I talked myself into signing up way back when and had quite a few creative hurdles to overcome on the way to the finish line, but we made it! Just in time for the holidays, too. I'm first on the posting list, according to our admin, so here goes! Really hope you guys enjoy these grumpy old farts as much as I did writing them!

He’s dying.

Even a fresh recruit without his decades of training would know that.

Jack Morrison, former pride of Overwatch, (unworthy) commander of some of the finest soldiers in history, bleeding out in some mud-soaked alley like a gutted dog.

What a sight.

He fights, because all that’s left are the animal instincts clawing at his shredded nerves, demanding that he keep breathing, keep trying to protect himself. His breaths come shallow and wet, punctured lungs already struggling to allow him the oxygen necessary to stay conscious.

Even supersoldiers have limits, and Los Muertos managed to push him there.

Hindsight is 20/20 and all that. He knows he shouldn’t have gone after the stragglers once he saw the girl safely home. He did it because he was angry. Because people doing shit like that don’t deserve to go home to a warm meal and a comfortable bed. 

He didn’t count on their stockpiled arsenal including another one of those damn gatling guns. He didn’t count on the cowards turning around like cornered strays and showing their teeth. He was tired, already injured, and completely unprepared.

Hindsight is great but it’s doing shit all for him while he’s lying here in a growing pool of his own blood with his visor smashed and flung far out of reach. 

“Finish it, you damn cowards,” he snarls through bloodied teeth, near sightless eyes struggling to track the murky shadows shifting in and out of his peripheral vision.

One or two of them sound ready to take him up on his offer, up until their eager chatter dissolves into panicked screams.

Jack blinks sluggishly, pushing himself against the grimy wall at his back, and tries to tune his failing ears to everything happening in front of him. Try and make sense of whatever it is. The screams are interspersed with the sickening wet _crunch_ of what he can only assume are breaking limbs (or possibly necks). Once the screams peter out, there’s just silence. Not even a tread of boots or anything hinting at someone having arrived on the scene.

Then, Jack recognizes the hazy scent in his nose for what it is: smoke.

He inhales sharply, the effort almost making him swoon, and gropes around the cement at his side for his rifle. When he comes up empty-handed, clumsy fingers fumble pathetically at the sidearm holstered against his thigh.

 _”Shhhh…”_ the voice comes out of the murky darkness in front of his eyes so suddenly and so _close_ -

Jack startles badly, almost braining himself against the wall behind him, if it wasn’t for the gloved hand that suddenly catches the crown of his skull, gentling him until all he can do is stare blankly in front of him.

“Open up, Morrison,” the voice comes again, and it’s just familiar enough that Jack’s guts loop into sudden knots.

“Wait-“ 

He tries to speak, bewildered, but doesn’t get much further than that before there’s this oily slick pouring into his mouth and down his throat, sudden enough that his body doesn’t even have a chance to reject it.

His throat spasms, trying to gag, but whatever it is has already pushed far past any of his failing defenses.

Jack groans, helpless, limbs twitching as the _stuff_ filters out through his body, lighting up every nerve, making his skin feel like it’s on _fire_. He shivers, a garbled protest making its way past his lips, but the hand at the back of his head moves to cover his mouth, silencing him once more.

He feels sharp points pressing carefully into the scarred flesh of his cheeks, and even that light pressure is something close to agony. He can’t focus on any one event too closely, but it feels like cracked ribs are _fusing_ back into alignment even as he breathes through it, lungs slowly filling with more oxygen than fluid.

Jack retches against the hand covering his mouth and it obligingly moves away, allowing him to fall forward onto his hands, coughing and gagging as his lungs expel the blood that had started filling them. His chest heaves like a bellows, and once the retching ends, he collapses forward in a dazed heap, the strength finally going out of his limbs.

Large (clawed?) hands gently turn him onto his side, which is a habit even his disoriented brain can recognize as someone trained at least in some basic field medicine. Don’t leave someone who’s puking their guts out on their back; they’ll more than likely choke on their own vomit. He tries to communicate his thanks, but all that comes out is a garbled grunt. He shivers again, nerves still sparking and neurons firing at random through his muscles. 

He feels…alive. The pain isn’t gone by any means, but the immediate agony of quite literally dying is just…gone. He can tell his lungs are whole, and the rest of the more severe injuries aren’t scraping his nerves raw anymore. His entire body aches like he just got run over by a tank, but compared to bleeding out against the alley wall, this is infinitely preferable.

“Wait,” he manages a single word, the sound scraping over his vocal cords like gravel. 

The smoke is still present, but it’s fading, so he knows whoever this is (and he has a slowly-forming idea of their identity already percolating in his hazy mind) is moving away. Either that, or is in the process of leaving entirely. But he senses a pause, like everything in the alley has gone still and is waiting. For a sign or for an order, he isn’t entirely sure which. 

“Next time, old man,” comes the distorted metallic growl.

Jack grits his teeth, frustration and exhaustion warring in him as the smoke slowly fades away and he’s left with nothing but his aching bones and an odd feeling in his chest. It’s like someone reached in there and left something warm and indistinct in the center of him. 

It’s unnerving, but at least it’s not uncomfortable. 

He stays immobile for a bit, then eventually forces himself to his feet. No sense in leaving himself around as an eager target for Los Muertos again. Wouldn’t be very polite to be so ungrateful for his interloper’s assistance, either. 

Time to put himself together enough to walk and figure out how to get back to the safe house without his damn visor. He’s done it before, and he’ll do it again. Maybe just a little slower this time around.

»»-------------¤-------------««

“You are trying to tell me that someone, presumably Reaper, saved you from that gang because you have a _gut feeling_?”

Ana’s voice rings with disapproval and disdain both, and Jack can’t fault her for either. While he himself has no fondness for the mercenary, he knows Ana’s dislike runs deeper. She’s still the same trained assassin, and she has no respect for butchers that kill for money. And it would sound crazy to his own ears if he didn’t have all the puzzle pieces to back it up. The omnipresent smoke, the clawed gloves on his face, the voice…

“I know, I know,” he raises both hands placatingly, wincing when Ana aims a keen glare in his direction. “Ana, we both know I’m not an idiot.”

He earns a positively scathing look for that one, but he soldiers on regardless. All the clues are slowly coming together in his head, and if the conclusion is the right one, everything he’s thought to be solid fact since Switzerland is about to come down around his ears.

“Alright, not a complete idiot. But I know what happened. I was there and I might not be able to see for shit but the rest of me isn’t shutting down yet. Mostly thanks to him, for now.”

It’s indecently hot and he almost longs for the icy winds in Switzerland the longer he focuses on the sweat dripping down the curvature of his spine under his jacket and body armor. 

Jack crosses his arms and eyes her from behind the shield of his visor. While certainly always the keenest of their original troop, she was also the most willing to mediate and listen to all sides. Here, he can tell her own experiences with Reaper run directly contradictory to this incident, but she’s not outright turning her back and walking away. So that’s something.

He still feels a little…odd, right in the center of his torso. It’s faded since the encounter, and it seems to be trailing off into nothing, but it’s lasted far longer than a night spent in a biotic field usually tends to. 

“So, what?” Ana gestures exasperatedly. “Let’s say he did save you. Then what? Are you marked for some purpose? Is it part of some larger assassination plot? You can’t stop looking at the bigger picture just because your ego has decided your importance trumps everyone else’s.”

“If he wanted to assassinate me, he would’ve done it then and there,” Jack sighs, rubbing the nape of his neck as he can feel the beginnings of a tension headache creeping in at his temples. “He’s a lot of things but he isn’t stupid. And he doesn’t waste time. I’m alive because he deliberately saved me. And if he was using some Talon tech to brainwash me, the last thing I would’ve done would be to come find you about it.”

Ana makes a dismissive noise, but doesn’t press the point. They used to get along better. Before. But that’s in the past and they’re making do with what they have now. Even if it means trying to function as a triad with only two pieces out of the three present. It’s a sore spot he isn’t sure that they’ll ever discuss. 

The revelation that Gabriel is not dead, and is in fact Reaper, was something that almost broke him completely. Ana had been there, of course, having been forced to reveal herself to save his sorry hide. She helped him off the ground and got him pointed in the right direction again, but he can’t admit that he’s not still shaken. 

Gabriel Reyes died. He saw it. _Felt_ it, as Gabe’s pulse fluttered into nothing under his shaking fingers before he tried pulling himself out of the wreckage to scream for help that never came. 

“If it was Reaper, what exactly do you plan to do next?”

Jack glances up at her, the red tint of his visual assistance through the visor making it difficult to pick up on the nuances of her expression. She’s warming her hands around the mug of her tea, though he really does have to wonder why someone would want to put themselves through drinking scalding liquid of any kind in 95° heat with humidity crawling up everyone’s asses.

“Flowers? A thank you card? Perhaps a phone call?” Ana gives him an exasperated look and slings her rifle properly over her shoulder, clearly wrapping up the threads of their conversation.

“I don’t know.”

Her visible eyebrow climbs towards her snow-white hair, and Jack knows he’d be blushing if he didn’t have the benefit of having his entire face obscured behind his mask. 

“Maybe I’ll find him, maybe I won’t. But I want answers. I know you do too. So I’ll figure it out.”

She watches him for a bit longer, and he doesn’t even need to glance her way to feel the weight of her gaze. They’re both too old for this by a few decades and change, but they haven’t thrown in the towel yet. And by the looks of it, neither of them have plans to anytime soon. There’s some comfort in that; a sort of solidarity amongst the old guard that Jack appreciates more than he knows how to put into words. 

“Take care of yourself, Jack,” she murmurs, reaching out to lay a hand on his masked cheek.

Jack takes a selfish moment to lean into the touch, even if he can’t feel it on his skin. He closes his eyes and exhales.

“Ma’am, yes, ma’am.”

He smiles just a bit, even though she can’t see it, but she can probably hear it anyways. She could always read him just as good as Gabriel. 

She nods, lets her hand fall, and steps back. 

Her current garb allows her to disappear into her hood effortlessly and disguise the rather bulky shape of her sniper rifle in the multiple layers of her jacket and cloak. She smiles wanly and tugs the corner of her hood just far enough to obscure the patch over her eye before she turns and quite literally melts into the bustling marketplace crowd. 

Jack loses sight of her in a few seconds, and he can’t help but marvel the same way he always has about her ability to blend in. Then again, given her specialties have always been observation and reconnaissance, her skillset has always been geared towards her strengths.

He, on the other hand, doesn’t bother with disguises or stealth these days. The jacket is blatant enough, and if he wants to see anything further than six inches in front of his face, he doesn’t really have a choice about the visor. It’s not like he has many secrets left to keep, anyways. Let the world stare and maybe he can offer some small reminder of the heroes that the U.N. used to trot out like show ponies to calm anxious citizens the world over.

With a long sigh, he thumbs over the sidearm holstered at his thigh and wonders where he should start looking for a flight to Los Angeles.

»»-------------¤-------------««

Turns out, pilots aren’t exactly thin on the ground these days, especially when you’ve got some spare change to pass off for the favor.

And _especially_ when you happen to know one of the best (ex) pilots who’s got ears to the ground in every direction. Being a feisty Brit with an adrenaline junkie streak a mile wide might influence her opinion of who exactly is capable of getting you from A to B without inadvertently killing you both with their stunt tricks, but he hasn’t been able to figure out a firm opinion on that yet. 

“I owe you for that one, do I?” he taps the comm on the earpiece of his mask, grinning in spit of himself as her overly cheery voice comes over the line.

“You bet your perky arse you do!”

Jack snorts, tugging at his chute lines. “I haven’t had a _perky arse_ in about thirty years, Lena.”

“Just ‘cause it’s the wrong tree doesn’t mean I can’t bark, darlin’!”

He outright laughs at that, and can’t even find it in him to scold her. Decades too young she might be, but she can hold her own with the best of them. He tries not to think how Gabe might’ve handled her if she’d been around in Overwatch’s formative years. 

“Alright, spunky, time to sign off and let me get back to work.”

Lena laughs, and he has to take a moment to enjoy the sound since it’s been far too long since he’s heard anyone laugh and _mean_ it. 

“Yeah, yeah. Give that spooky death cloud a kick in the nads while you’re at it, would you?”

Jack grunts, not bothering to affirm or deny that one. He taps off the comm and focuses on bundling the chute back into his pack, keeping a wary ear trained on his surroundings. Whether it was irony or luck, his chauffer decided to drop him in the brush right behind the Hollywood sign.

Once he has everything stowed, he hefts his rifle onto his shoulder and moves to stand between the Y and W, gazing out over the city spread from the foothills to the ocean. 

He’s been here a fair few times. Most of those times being good memories with Gabe’s family. He’d thought about bringing up the idea of moving once or twice before… but the opportunity never came around and now it’s effectively a moot point. What use to dead men have for homes?

He’s been following Reaper’s activities over the past several weeks, and though he seems concentrated in Western Europe for the moment, Jack knows Gabriel can go anywhere he wants whenever he wants. Being comprised of whatever the hell he’s made of kind of renders normal methods of transportation outdated and useless.

Jack sticks to the back road shortcuts and nearly empty side streets Gabriel showed him whenever he was in town. No sense in attracting unwanted attention when he’s not even here looking for anybody in particular. 

He’s kept a sharp eye on the city since Switzerland. Maybe it’s out of stubborn loyalty to the man he fell in love with and never fell out of love with, or maybe he just doesn’t like leaving jobs unfinished. He hasn’t allowed criminal elements like Los Muertos to get their claws in anywhere long enough to establish anything before he clears them out again when he’s in the neighborhood. Other than those visits, the city seems to be doing relatively well. It also seems to be one of the more pro-Overwatch places around the world too. While it’s by no means a majority sentiment, his occasional appearances, combined with other agents that Winston directs to old operative safe houses in the area, haven’t been met with anger or backlash. 

In fact, today is a reminder of what exactly they thought they were fighting for once upon a time.

He’s run into a group of kids hanging out in the alley behind (presumably) one of their homes, and they all lit up the moment they caught sight of him. He’s just called _the Soldier_ by the general population, or so goes the common theme between his various encounters with civilians. These kids are no exception.

They’re young, maybe pre-teens. Exactly the age that they would’ve scarcely been born during Overwatch’s heyday. Jack smiles at them from behind his mask, and even goes so far as to crouch down and let the group examine the pulse rifle. The shorthaired girl in ratty jeans seems more interested in his mask, however.

“Why d’you wear that thing?”

“I’m not that fond of having my face splashed across every holo on the ‘net,” he explains as gently as he knows how. “And it helps me with targeting in the field.”

Jack activates the tactical lens of the visor to illustrate that point, and the girl nods solemnly, mouth slightly open as she takes in the garish colors of his jacket and gear. The rest of the kids are gradually losing interest, more focused on ribbing each other and gossiping amongst themselves. 

Then, the girl abruptly freezes.

She’s staring down towards the end of the alley at his back, and he knows what’s likely to be there even without turning around. _Damn._ And he was hoping he _wouldn’t_ have to make any noise this time.

“All of you go. Right now,” he gestures with a gloved hand, already tightening his grip on the rifle and bracing to put his body between the kids and whoever’s just joined the party. 

“But Mister–!” the girl grabs hold of his elbow and tries to tug him along after her while her friends flee.

“Hey!” comes a few voices chiming in together from the other end of the alley. “We don’t want you here! Overwatch filth!”

“Kid, _go_!” Jack shoves her as gently as he can, then finally turns to face the interlopers.

There’s five of them, masked and dressed in an impressive collection of body armor likely salvaged from combat zones and armed with anything from a spiked bat to a couple of modified shotguns that remind him a bit of the man he’s still hunting. If he had to guess, he’d say they’re probably in their mid-twenties; just old enough to remember the wars and be plenty angry about what happened after.

“Look, there’s no need for all that,” Jack gestures at their collective weaponry, making sure to keep his finger resting on the rifle’s trigger guard rather than curled over it. “I’m just passing through. That’s all. Scout’s honor, I’ll be gone before you all can blink.”

“Fuck you!” the taller one shouts, gesticulating violently with the muzzle of his shotgun. “We’re not letting you just turn tail outta here! Cowardly piece of shit!”

Damn.

He’d hoped that there was a small chance he could talk the boys down and avoid getting into a scrap in the first place, but that doesn’t seem to be an option. They’re angry, and rightfully so, but that makes them all the more dangerously unpredictable.

“Boys, this isn’t the answer to what you’re looking for. I promise you that,” he keeps slowly backing up, hoping for a chance to duck down the adjoining alley for cover before things get ugly. “Go home, look out for your families.”

He can’t be sure which of them fires first, but the round stings like a sonofabitch when it smacks into the chest plate under his jacket. 

Grimacing, Jack hefts the rifle and fires a warning shot over their heads. 

Rather than having the effect he intended, that just sets them all off. The one with the bat seems to be the ringleader, rallying the rest of them to form a line and start firing. 

Jack knows he can’t present his back to a firing squad, but the alley still has a ways to go before it branches off, so he doesn’t have much in the way of options. He uses the reinforced edges of the pulse rifle to deflect the more poorly aimed shots, but that’s only good for so many when he doesn’t have the option of return fire.

He _will not_ harm these civilians. If he does, he’s just as bad as everyone who turned into opportunistic leeches after Overwatch imploded and left the globe scattering to pick up the pieces.

A few shotgun rounds have made it through the body armor. He can feel the metal scraping against a rib and his shoulder. When one bullet smashes into the side of his mask, slicing his cheek open and leaving him reeling, he snarls and aims a pulse round at the dilapidated building next to the boys.

The wall explodes, raining plaster and debris over them, but they barely flinch. These boys have been out here too long. Hell, they’ve probably been fighting what crawled out of the cracks in Overwatch’s absence since they were old enough to pick up a weapon.

Another bullet clips his visor, shattering the rest, and he’s left fumbling in the murky darkness again. He snarls, finger curled tight over the rifle’s trigger, and focuses every last sense he has on pinpointing where the boys are.

Up until one round catches him in the thigh while another rips through the collar of his jacket, right through the side of his neck. 

Jack hits the dirt with a groan, one hand moving instinctively to clamp down over the bright lance of agony where he knows his throat’s just been torn open. His thigh is on fire, and the rest of the impact points have faded to a dull ache in the face of probably dying in very short order.

He’s vaguely aware of a hand on his arm, a small hand, cobbled together with a recently familiar voice saying “Leave him alone!”

“Get outta here, kid,” he mumbles, but the hand doesn’t leave and he can hear her cheering on someone who is apparently not the crew of wannabe soldiers, judging by the sudden lack of shotgun reports and mindless yelling. 

“You didn’t kill them, did you?” she asks whoever it is, and the heavy boot tread approaching tells him exactly who it is.

“No,” comes the grating, metallic reply. “They should count themselves lucky.”

“You’re not as bad as everybody says you are,” the girl tells one of the most dangerous men in the world. “A bad person would’ve killed them.”

Jack flinches without meaning to, and that seems to draw her attention away from what he knows to be a tall owl-masked figure. 

“Oh, right,” she says, a bit sheepish. “He’s hurt. Can you fix him?”

Gabriel’s laugh is almost the same, even with the mask’s distortion. As eerie as the sound is, Jack finds some comfort in it.

“I’m not a doctor, girl,” Gabriel tells her, though there’s no meanness in it. “I’ll take things from here.”

“Okay,” the girl backs away, but Jack can still sense that she’s nearby. “Make sure he’s okay. He was really nice to us.”

Gabriel snorts, and Jack would smack him for the presumption of _picking him up_ if he wasn’t losing strength by the second.

“I can imagine nothing else,” Gabriel says, gently sarcastic. “Get home with your friends. It’s not safe out here.”

“Ask what her name is,” Jack rasps, tugging at what he hopes is the Reaper’s hood.

There’s a pause, then: “What’s your name, girl?”

“Tasha,” she answers without hesitation. “But everybody calls me Tash.”

“Thank you, Tash,” Jack manages, smiling crookedly in her direction.

“No problem, mister. Feel better!”

Jack lets his cheek fall against Gabriel’s shoulder and exhales slowly. He feels better already knowing that she’s safe, let alone that she probably had a hand in calling Gabriel here. If dazed and a bit out of his mind on the chemicals pulling his system into shock can be called _better_.

“Hold tight, old man,” Gabriel presses the mask against his bare temple.

“Hold on to what-“ is all Jack manages before everything seems to _bend_ around them. 

There’s rushing in his ears, like he’s falling through a tunnel, and something tells him that if he could see, he’d be utterly terrified. Then it’s over, and he’s being lowered onto something soft enough that it could possibly be a mattress but is probably a cot. Either way, he’ll take it.

“Sleep, Jackie,” a broad gloved hand settles over his eyes and even as he tries to protest, those clawed gauntlets press into his cheeks and he falls silent. Then, as the smoke starts to trail over his mouth, he shivers.

Not a minute later, he’s unconscious.

»»-------------¤-------------««

He wakes up and everything hurts.

He doesn’t feel like he’s on the brink of death, which is a marked improvement, but his entire body just _aches_. He still can’t see, but the faint warmth brushing against his skin tells him that Gabriel probably put one of his biotic fields down while he was out. 

Speaking of–

“Rise and shine, sleeping beauty,” comes the metallic rumble of a familiar voice. 

Jack grunts, and makes no effort to do either, which prompts a low chuckle. 

“Take the mask off,” he says, fully aware that Gabriel could vanish whenever he feels like it but willing to take the risk anyways.

“I don’t think that’s a very good idea.”

“And I don’t need to hear your bullshit Batman impression,” Jack snaps tiredly. “Take it off.”

There’s silence for a few moments, and Jack knows Gabriel’s probably debating whether or not to just knock him out again. Not apparently wins out, since he can hear a few clicks of what must be the mask’s locking mechanisms.

“You can’t even see me, can you?”

“Nope, come over here,” Jack pushes himself up against the pillows stacked behind him, then reaches out with his uninjured arm.

His fingers touch nothing for a while, until the tips suddenly brush over what he can only assume is skin. Skin that should rightly belong on a corpse, given how cold it is. He shivers, but doesn’t so much as flinch.

“Like I said. I don’t think this is a very good idea.”

“Oh, bullshit,” Jack growls. “If you didn’t, you wouldn’t have saved my ass back in Dorado. You wouldn’t have saved my ass out here.”

There’s a noncommittal grunt from a mouth close to his hand, and Jack sighs.

“I failed Overwatch. I failed you, Gabe,” he says, thumbing over the familiar sharp line of a cheekbone. “I think you know which one I regret more. I should’ve done a hell of a lot more. I should’ve listened to you.”

“Yeah, you fuckin’ should’ve.”

“You were right, I was wrong. I’ve known that for a while, you asshole. Not only did I have to find out you weren’t dead but you’re freelancing for _Talon_?”

“Who exactly is gonna pay something like me enough to put food on the table, huh?” Gabriel finally pulls back, testy.

“Don’t–“ Jack clenches his teeth, letting his hand fall to the bed. “Ana didn’t tell me what she saw. And I don’t care. You’re not a _thing_ , goddammit. You’re Gabriel Reyes.”

“Gabriel Reyes is dead. I’m his ghost. Better get used to it.”

“Ghosts don’t get to be corporeal, Gabe,” Jack slumps against the pillows again. “And they sure as hell don’t save their exes from the brink of death multiple times over. What the hell are we doing?”

He’s answered with silence for well over a minute, and Jack almost thinks that he’s alone again. But the heavy presence in the room hasn’t left. So maybe they’re actually going to talk about this.

“Would you believe me if I said I don’t know?”

Jack exhales slowly, closing his sightless eyes as he focuses on relaxing as many muscles in his body as he can manage. 

“Yeah. I have no idea what the hell we’re doing either. Welcome to the club.”

»»-------------¤-------------««

He wakes up the second time to what feels like fingertips on his lips.

Jack makes a disoriented noise, opening his mouth to say something about it, but one finger presses firmly against his lips.

“Shh. Keep that big mouth shut for a minute.”

He would have something to say about that, but he’s just…tired. Exhausted, really. That weird glowing feeling is back in the center of his chest, and he rubs over his sternum idly while Gabriel keeps on playing with his lips and chin.

“I thought you…consume souls,” he mumbles against Gabriel’s fingers, his own hand still rubbing vague circles around his chest. “What did you do last night? And the time before?”

Gabriel grunts indistinctly, clearly unhappy about being interrupted so soon after giving a direct order. He shouldn’t be so surprised. Jack never was that great of a listener. 

“I can use the energy and channel it in the opposite direction,” Gabriel explains, somewhat stiffly. “Modern medicine couldn’t have saved you either time. It’s not easy, but I can do it. Think I’m getting better at it, too.”

Jack pauses in his rubbing, now uncomfortably aware that he very well might have some mashed-together pieces of human souls stuffed in him as he recovers. The inherently curious part of him wants to poke deeper, to see if there’s a way to actually figure out what a soul looks like, but the rest of him would prefer to leave it a mystery.

“Thank you.”

He can hear leather creaking and fabric shifting as Gabriel presumably looks up, and he offers a small smile. It’s not much, in the face of how profoundly he managed to fuck everything up for them, but at least it’s something. A small step towards more steps that he hopes Gabriel might allow him to take.

“Yeah, well, don’t get used to it.”

Jack chuckles, settling back against his pillows and stretching luxuriously as the warmth from the biotic field really starts to settle into his muscles. 

“Do you need anything?” he asks, glancing in Gabriel’s direction. “Um…I don’t know if you eat but…”

Gabriel sighs, and Jack takes an odd amount of pleasure in the fact that there’s no distortion of the sound. He hasn’t put his mask back on yet.

“I can eat. Usually don’t. Souls are my thing, these days.”

Jack swallows, but forges on anyways. “Have you…had any recently?”

“Not recently enough. Gave most of my surplus to your sorry ass.”

“Could you take some back?” Jack frowns a bit.

Silence greets that suggestion, and Jack knows this is probably more than a sensitive topic, but if Gabriel is willing to answer this many questions, maybe he can push a little further.

“I could,” comes Gabriel’s reply. “Don’t know if that’s the best idea for your wrecked ass right now.”

Jack rolls his eyes. “You keep saying that shit and you keep doing the opposite anyways. You don’t need to sacrifice anything else for me, Gabe.”

That’s a barb he wasn’t planning on throwing, but it hits close enough to the mark anyways, if Gabriel’s quiet snarl is anything to go by. He doesn’t press on it any more than that, and waits to see if Gabriel will just take off or lash out. Either reaction is entirely acceptable, really. Jack wonders if getting socked in the face would make any of that festering guilt fade just a little more.

No fist comes flying at his face out of the dark, but a hand does land on his chest, pressing down firmly enough to brook no argument about its owner’s intention.

“Remember, you asked for this,” Gabriel’s chilled breath washes over his lips before sealing their mouths together.

Jack clenches his eyes shut, good hand coming up to grip Gabriel’s upper arm. A part of him wonders if this is how Gabriel consumes the souls of the people he kills. A slightly louder and more jealous part says no, this is absolutely not how Gabriel extracts someone’s soul.

There are certain elements of a kiss present, but with the oily smoke sliding down his throat while Gabriel licks at his teeth with a tongue that feels just long enough to be something other than human, that’s about where the similarities end. He can feel the smoke and the less-physical parts of Gabriel _pulling_ at whatever it is in his chest. Since the little bubbles of warmth aren’t technically his, they aren’t all that difficult to remove, but the sensation isn’t exactly the most pleasant thing he’s ever experienced.

Jack moans as Gabriel draws his tongue between his own lips and sucks aggressively, apparently more than aware that a distraction would be quite helpful. Jack’s fingers tighten on Gabriel’s arm and his entire body arches up against Gabriel’s hold as the smoke seems to _squeeze_ and slither right back out the way it came in. He shudders and jerks against the broad hand keeping him pressed against the bed, nerves feeling almost scraped raw. 

“Should’ve figured,” Gabriel purrs against his oversensitive lips, and Jack only belatedly realizes he’s referring to the half erect cock that’s probably tenting his pants to an embarrassing degree.

Jack’s cheeks flame, and he tries to duck away but Gabriel catches his mouth in a slow, deliberate kiss. There’s the hint of a threat behind it, mixed up with possessiveness and bitterness both. But it’s mostly just the filthy sort of necking they got up to in between missions once upon a time.

“You always were a kinky fuck, Jackie,” Gabriel’s voice is fondly exasperated and Jack can’t help but laugh. 

“Can’t blame a man for getting interested when his boyfriend wants to _spice things up_ ,” he places deliberate emphasis on the last three words, since he honestly can’t remember the number of times Gabriel brought up that exact phrase whenever he wanted to try something new.

Gabriel’s still chuckling, then there’s a broad hand cupping up between his legs, startling him enough to illicit a full-body jerk. 

“You know, it’s not very nice to sneak up on a blind man like that,” Jack feels compelled to point out, though there’s not much heat in it.

“Put your damn hand on my face if it matters so much,” Gabriel snorts, moving on to kneading him through the soft fabric of the pants he was probably changed into while he was unconscious. “I ain’t gonna baby your ass.”

It’s…freeing, really, to hear that. The other agents have had a variety of reactions to finding out he’s effectively sightless without the aid of the visor, and he can’t help feeling coddled no matter how good someone’s intentions are when they’re dealing with him. To know his ex(?) won’t be doing any coddling in the slightest is a breath of fresh air.

“I could look like anything and you wouldn’t even know it,” Gabriel keeps working at him, firm and steady pressure. “I might not even look human anymore.”

Jack bites his lip and tries to push his hips up into Gabriel’s hand, shivering as he feels a wet spot starting to spread across the front of his briefs and the pants. “Told you, don’t care. You felt pretty human earlier.”

Gabriel’s breath is suddenly washing over his lips again, startlingly hot for how cold Jack remembers his skin being. Maybe the energy he took back had a hand in that. “I can look however I want, Jackie. Maybe I’ll even give you a taste when you can appreciate it properly.”

The hand gripping him twists abruptly, dragging fabric against hypersensitive skin at just the right angle, and Jack’s gone. He shudders, jerking helplessly in Gabriel’s grip as the wet warmth spreads across the front of his pants, his fingers still wrapped tightly around Gabriel’s upper arm.

“I can’t believe I missed that face,” Gabriel rumbles, reaching up without making a token effort to clean his hand and pushing his thumb between Jack’s lips. “Damn, but you do make a pretty picture when you’re coming your brains out in my hand.”

Jack suckles dazedly on Gabriel’s thumb, his arm slowly falling back to his side, and then makes a disgruntled noise when it’s pulled away without warning. 

“Get some rest, old man,” Gabriel drops what Jack is almost certain is a kiss against his temple. “I’ll be here when you wake up. Probably.”

“Gabe, wait…” Jack inhales sharply when he hears the creaking of wood and leather as Gabriel makes to get up, but it pauses when he opens his mouth. “Thank you.”

“Yeah, well,” Gabriel probably shrugs, judging by the continued sounds of leather and fabric pulling against each other as he gets up fully and starts moving further away.

Jack exhales slowly, closing his eyes as he settles back onto the pillows. They’re not all right, and they probably won’t ever be, but maybe there’s a chance to salvage something of what they had. And if there is a chance, he’s more than willing to fight for it.


End file.
